These Magic Shoes Changed My Lazy Approach to Getting Dressed
Hello, I’m Madison, and if there's one word my friends would use to describe me, it’s lazy. I like to get work done, but at the end of the day, I am the embodiment of Garfield, a sleeping sloth, a stereotyped millennial come to life. Laundry? I'll just use every item of clothing and wear dresses with spandex shorts instead of underwear until I have nothing left and must go to the laundromat. Buying toiletries? Better to use up every drop of the four, random travel-sized toothpastes in my apartment than go out and buy myself a regular one. Shoes? Please let me completely obliterate every pair I have on the streets of New York before dragging myself to a store to get new ones.
That last part was what intrigued me about Mime et moi shoes. I first spotted them on Instagram Stories, where I saw a girl magically switching out the heels on the bottom of her shoe, quickly changing it from a flat to a heel. (See how in the video, below.) Was this a real thing? I wondered. After some Googling, it was clear these has been around for a while (hello, Who What Wear), but to me it was a brand-new marvel.
Are you telling me I could walk comfortably to the subway and then switch into heels for the office without lugging a second pair of shoes with me? This lazy sack o’ bones had to try it out. So thanks to Mime et moi, I spent one crazy, busy day in New York City wearing their magical shoes. Here’s how it went down:
Going to Brunch
On this particular Saturday, my parents were in town, and while they weren’t here for the full-on New York Tourist Experience, we still had a lot planned. To start, I had to walk to the subway in Brooklyn so I could meet them for brunch in Manhattan. I put on the shoes as flats (really, there is no fully “flat” option—they come with a very teeny heel), and put two different sized heels in my bag: a pair of block heels and a pair of higher, thinner heels. When you purchase the shoes, you're sent the flat option and then you get to choose one other heel, but for the sake of this article, I decided to try two. (You can also buy extra heels separately for $35-50.)
I was a little scared about wearing new shoes on a full day of walking, but I am nothing if not lazy dedicated to ELLE.com, so I buckled them up and went out the door. They were surprisingly comfortable, like little cushions hugging my feet, and I had a pleasant jaunt all the way to brunch. Then I promptly forgot about all footwear as my mom and I devoured a basket of fresh baked bread. Priorities.
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The next stop on our not-so-touristy-NYC day was walking around the Whitney Museum of American Art. Everyone there always looks cool and modern and like they walked straight out of an Instagram ad, so I knew I had to change my lewk. At the brunch table, I slid off the “flat” heel and clicked on the block heels. It was truly so easy—again, why didn't I know about these before!!—and I did it all while sitting down and waiting for my mom to finish her coffee. Suddenly, I was much taller and felt a hell of a lot cooler.
Back to Basics
In the name of total transparency, I must tell you we took a cab from brunch to the museum (thank you, parents), so I wasn’t too worried about walking around in the block heel. We got to our destination, and I continued to feel extremely chic, until my feet started to get a little uncomfortable and I got tired of walking around in a heel while staring at paintings. So I plopped down on a huge cushion intended for those watching an art film and conveniently switched back to the flats.
Mime et moi Twirls Denim Blue, $225; mimemoi.com Reaching New Heights
Later we did the parents-visiting-New-York evening activity: dinner and a show. This was my chance to change into the highest heel I brought, which I soon realized were also the highest heels I had EVER worn. But there was a snafu. I tried to do the same motions I had done before—flipping the tab on the sole of the shoe up so I could slide out the heel, sliding on the new heel and then stepping down in order to click it on—but it just wasn’t working. Whatever I did, I could not get it to click. I was pretty terrified of actually breaking the shoe in the process, so I simply gave up, put the block heel back on and figured I’d try again later.
We met my boyfriend at the restaurant and immediately when we sat down, I told him about my magic shoes and took out all three heels so he could get the full effect. Magic shoes? he asked, while he quietly laughed about how ridiculous my job is. I explained that I wanted to do the highest heel but couldn’t figure out how it worked. Then—somehow—using the force of his boyfriend arms, he was able to slide off the block heels and snap the high heels into place! Magic! Suddenly I came up to his shoulder (he’s 6’1”) and regained all the power I had lost in those few minutes when he was better at my shoes than I was.
By the end of the day, my feet were a little beat up from wearing new shoes, but my heart was happy that I actually looked like I put effort into my outfit instead of wearing my usual scuffed up sneakers.
There are four other heels I didn’t get the chance to try that day, but even just those three options let me easily switch up my vibe and made one dress go from day to night with almost zero effort—and without taking up a ton of room in my purse. The price is a little steep, but technically you're getting two pairs of shoes, so maybe it's actually a deal? And as a self-proclaimed lazy girl, there isn't much more I could ask for.